Maintaining health during the summer excitement

CAIRO – 13 August 2017: So, we’re up to our last few weeks of summer and most of us are trying to live it up while it lasts, as you quite rightly should. Here are three simple ways to maintain your health and still experience all the excitement during summer that you look forward to all year.


1. Eat what you want, but don’t over eat. Most of us spend the year restricting ourselves from things we want to do and things we want to eat so we can practice self-control and maintain our weight. What happens then, is that in the summer we end up letting completely loose because we’re sick of having self-imposed rules about what we can or cannot eat and drink. Here is how you handle something like this, eat whatever it is you want, but in small quantities. Instead of having French fries every day, have it every other day. Instead of eating that huge piece of cake, give yourself a bite or two. You see, it’s not necessarily always the type of food you’re eating alone that’s the problem, it’s also accompanied by the problem of quantities. Most people eat until they can no longer breath. What I’m suggesting is, allow yourself that thing that you are craving, but do so in small bite size quantities. You’ll relieve your craving and you’ll maintain that body you worked all year for.

2. Your workouts don’t need to be hours upon hours. A short, but focused, 30 minute workout is far more effective than a 3 hour workout with no goal to it. If you know why you are working out, what it is you want to gain from working out, then you can do a concentrated and effective 30-minute workout to help your body stay fit and still have time to enjoy the day’s sunshine, while at the beach with your friends. You certainly also don’t need to make that trip to the gym, you are can do that 30 minute workout from the comfort of your own home.

3. Stay hydrated. A lot of the times when we think we’re hungry, your body is just dehydrated and is craving water. Instead of giving it what it wants, we end up eating, which does the exact opposite of what we need. When we drink the amount of water that our body needs daily in order to stay hydrated, we end up eating the correct amount of food for our bodies. Make your goal to finish your day drinking 2 litres of water. If you aren’t the kind of person who is used to continuously drinking water then every day, replace one of your preferred drinks with a cup of water and then as the days pass increase that amount by one cup a day. Eventually, you will get to a point where your water intake is at the right place. Again, major changes need to happen gradually so that you don’t scare your body into collapsing.


The idea is this, if you make your goal achievable then you can progress, and with time you can then start pushing your goals further and further. Things become achievable and manageable when we are realistic with what and how we want to achieve. I am a firm believer that everything in moderation is the key to happiness and having the best of both worlds. You’ll most certainly enjoy the best of summer and make sure you exit the summer holiday more fabulous than you waltzed into it.


Deana Shaaban is a Performance Training Coach at Ignite